It's not too hard, really, there are only 4 chapters that contain the word 'desert'... and the first, 1:16, is purely geographical.
The descendants of Moses' father-in-law, the Kenite, went up from the City of Palms with the men of Judah to live among the people of the Desert of Judah in the Negev near Arad.
It did make me smile, though, because the tour bus drove through Arad on the way to and from the Bedoin camp that we stayed at last May. And...I wondered...could the folks who are running that camp today be somehow related to those folks who came to live among the people of Judah? Hmm..
That's the only happy thought in the whole discussion of 'desert' in the book of Judges.
Next we have chapter 8, in which Gideon is pursuing the kings of Midian, Zebah and Zalmunna with his skeleton army of three hundred men who had attacked the camp. Hungry and exhausted, they chased their enemies across the Jordan and asked at the village of Succoth for bread for the men to eat so they could be strengthened to continue the pursuit. But the leaders of the city copped an attitude and basically said, 'Why should we treat you like you already won the battle?' and refused.
Gideon, who had already dealt with the bad attitude of the Ephraimites, was not happy.
The Gideon replied, "Just for that, when the LORD has given Zebah and Zalmunna into my hand, I will tear your flesh with desert thorns and briars." (8:7).
Further down the road, they made the same request at Peniel and received the same answer; Gideon declared he would tear the city tower down after he had defeated his enemies (8:9)
Of course, he captured the Midianites, and, returning, caught a young man from Succoth and learned the names of the 77 elders of the town. When they got to town, he displayed his captives to the elders and
He took the elders of the town and taught the men of Succoth a lesson by punishing them with desert thorns and briers. (8:16). Then he tore down the tower of Peniel and killed all the men there, in retaliation for their refusal to help in the defeat of Israel's enemies.
The next desert references are in chapter 11; Jepthah sent messengers to the king of Ammon, correcting his mistaken view of history, and he mentions the desert in verses 16 and 18...
'But when they came up out of Egypt, Israel went through the desert to the Red Sea and on to Kadesh...Next they traveled through the desert, skirted the lands of Edom and Moab, and camped on the other side of the Arnon. They did not enter the territory of Moab, for the Arnon was its border.'
Jepthah goes on to describe the attack from the Amorites, led by Sihon, and their subsequent defeat, this time using 'desert' as description of conquered territory:
'Then the LORD, the God of Israel, gave Sihon and all his men into Israel's hands, and they defeated them. Israel took over all the land of the Amorites who lived in that country, capturing all of it from the Arnon to the Jabbok and from the desert to the Jordan.' (11:21-22).
The Ammonite king preferred his version of the story, though, which meant that he had claim to the land that Israel had captured from the Amorites, and he attacked them, resulting in his defeat and a personal tragedy for Jepthah.
The last references to the desert are in chapter 20...one of the most dismal stories in Judges. Not going into the horrible events that led up to this; you can read that in chapter 19. Men from one of the towns of the tribe of Benjamin had done something so vile that the other tribes were determined to punish the offenders...but the Benjamites went to war against their kinsmen rather than give up the guilty ones. After two days of battle, during which the Benjamites inflicted great losses on the rest of the Israelites, the Israelites set an ambush and slaughtered the fighting men of Benjamin.
So they fled before the Israelites in the direction of the desert, but they could not escape the battle. And the men of Israel who came out of the towns cut them down there....As they turned and fled toward the desert to the rock of Rimmon, the Israelites cut down five thousand men along the roads. They kept pressing after the Benjamites as far as Gidom and struck down two thousand more...But six hundred men turned and fled into the desert to the rock of Rimmon, where they stayed four months. (20:42,45,47)
Then the Israelites turned back to the territory of the Benjamites and continued the punishment, slaughtering people and livestock and burning towns.In the end, the eleven tribes attacking Benjamin had lost an average of about 3,600 soldiers each, while the Benjamites lost 25,000 just from their tribe. In chapter 21, you can read of the fallout from that calamity, and how the people grieved for the tribe of Benjamin and concocted a work-around for the men who were left to Benjamin to get wives to rebuild the tribe...all in all a very sad business.
Judges uses the word 'desert' as a geographical reference, an historical reference and...an adjective, for the thorns and briars Gideon used to punish the elders of Succoth. I think it's interesting that something that came from the desert was used to inflict punishment, while the remnant of the fighting men of Benjamin fled to the rock in the desert for safety. There's no evidence that the tribe of Benjamin ever repented for their actions, but yet the Israelites actually made sacrifices themselves to restore them, as they grieved for the loss...that's a picture of grace, for all the punishment prior had been brutal, for both the punished and the punisher.
This has started me thinking... God was with the Israelites; he had told them to go to battle, and told them to send Judah first. Yet the attack was still costly; something like 40,000 Israelites were killed in the three days of battle. I kinda see a picture here...sin has a price, it costs something. The Israelites mourned and wept even as they were going to battle...and the battle hurt them. Yet the sin was grievous and the consequences had to follow. Do you see...it hurts God for us to suffer the consequences of our sin. It's kind of a stretch but the suffering of the Israelites to correct their kinsfolk is giving me a glimpse of God's grief involved in correcting his people. So many folks seem to have the impression that God relishes punishing miscreants...but I think He allowed the Israelites to suffer such painful loss in the process to illustrate just what it actually costs to deal with folks who chose to do wrong.
But it's a cost that He pays, time and time again, and ultimately he took the full punishment himself.
Good Friday is when we commemorate the ultimate price that He paid, before we ever repented.
It's probably not a coincidence that it was the third day that the victory was won...
Just my musings. Don't attach too much significance here because it's beyond me. But, wow...
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